Magic Market Index for May 3rd, 2018

Welcome to The Magic Market Index. This weekly article series documents the price changes of cards currently in print, and offers insight into what cards to invest in and what to ignore. This weekly article series covers all expansion sets and masterpiece series sets in Standard, from the time of their prerelease to the time of their rotation out of Standard. Promotional sets, special sets, pack foils, and non-set releases are not covered.

Most of the set has begun its retraction period following release. Teferi and Lyra being the two major exceptions, having each doubled in price this week. Both are coming out of the gates as all stars in Dominaria's new standard.

Lyra is becoming a staple of many WX control builds, highly reminiscent of Baneslayer Angel's wide usage in her meta. Control decks not trying to win with Approach have found a game ender, and I expect that she'll stay popular for quite some time.

Teferi is likewise finding a home in several decks contending for Standard play, from WU Second Sun to Bant Super Friends, and a great many WUX decks in between. The strength of being in multiple decks is greatly increasing the price, and if his status among them remains, he might very well stay near this price point.

For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. As Teferi and friends have become prominent early in this new Standard's metagame, The Immortal Sun has instantly gained more favor. Brawl and Commander have definitely helped, but recent pushback from planeswalker-free control builds have given it some extra nudge up.

Tendershoot Dryad is this set's other breakout star, being a key card in GB Saprolings. Dominaria gave saproling token decks a very strong offering, and Tendershoot excels at both creating these tokens and being a powerful lord that finishes the game. Sporecrown Thallid might have a quicker and more prominent growth, but Tendershoot is the windmill-slam haymaker that ends games.

Various WX Control, Aggro Control, and Combo builds have been coming out of Dominaria's shake up, as well as a strong surge in Approach of the Second Sun, and Settle the Wreckage is one of their go-to removal spells. Although the ramp given to the opponent can be rough, these decks aren't stabilizing early enough to count on Fumigate alone. I'm reluctant to estimate this card's price in the coming weeks, as play counts seem to change between builds. When Grand Prix Birmingham hits next weekend, I think we'll have a very clear picture of where this card is going.

Dominaria has caused quite a few big movements in the sets above, but Hour appears to be immune. This set is very top heavy, and moving even further in that direction. The Scarab God and Invocations now represent a full one-third of the estimated value of the box average. A box with both a Scarab God and an Invocation has an astonishing $150 average value, while a box without either averages only $60 of value. As Invocations continues to climb, so too do the unbalancing values. Hour is now the gambler's set.

WX Control has dominated much of Dominaria's brewing, and all cards attached have risen this week. Gideon of the Trials isn't as common in new control builds as Teferi, but he's still gaining a new surge of popularity. Approach of the Second Sun's recent resurgence is a strong culprit, as are the new crop of Standard Super Friends decks.

No buyouts this week, but there's growth all around. As mentioned above, Invocations has been eating more and more of Hour and Amonkhet's average box value. This is great if you've already invested in Invocations, but is making opening boxes of Amonkhet block more and more of a gamble.

Metallic Mimic might look like a human on her card, but recently she's taken on a much more saproling style. Mimic isn't quite at staple level in GB Saprolings, but she's definitely making a splash. WB Knights have also included her, although Knights has not yet put up any consistent resultss. Mimic works for any tribe, and Standard has a slew of tribes to choose from - even if some are relegated to more casual levels.

Kaladesh remained quiet this week. Only Torrential Gearhulk saw relevant movement. Like many of the above mentions, this is directly related to popularity of various WUX Control builds that have dominated Dominaria's shake up. Lyra Dawnbringer's popularity as the new finisher has staved off any giant leaps Gearhulk might have otherwise seen, but he should still see some more movement.

Inventions echoes Invocations this week, as we are without buyout but still see an overall price creep. Although the Kaladesh half has a higher average, the Aether Revolt half has far less variance in its prices. Kaladesh offers the golden ticket, while Aether Revolt offers more consistency.

Overall Summary

This week's changes were centralized mainly around WX Control builds, with most of the focus on WU Control and Approach of the Second Sun. With GB Saprolings also making a splash, we are interestingly devoid of one color in Dominaria's shake up: red. Only a few weeks ago, Red Aggro was the king of all things Standard, but Dominaria has apparently run away with its crown and left it in its dust. Next weekend is Grand Prix Birmingham, and we will have a couple of strong weeks ahead of us. Approaching the first Dominaria Grand Prix, I full expect to see a lot of cards creep upward in anticipation. After we get the first major tournament's results, we'll then see prices scrambling to match the top decks. Commentary can often be hard in slow weeks, when nothing noteworthy happens. I don't foresee this being an issue for the rest of May.

<p>The <em>Magic Market Index</em> is a weekly article series that documents the prices of all new released expansions throughout their life in Standard. The <em>Magic Market Index</em> is designed to give you easy access to current pricing and trends, with minor commentary that helps single out the significant changes you need to be aware of.</p>